Well, here's some juicy tidbits from the New York Times about Donald Trump completely losing it on Attorney General Jeff Sessions moments after he found out a special counsel had been appointed to take over the Russia probe. Imagine yourself as a fly on the wall in the Oval Office on May 17 just after White House Counsel Don McGahn hangs up the phone with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who at the time was overseeing the Russia probe. McGahn drops the news about Robert Mueller taking over the investigation.
Almost immediately, Mr. Trump lobbed a volley of insults at Mr. Sessions, telling the attorney general it was his fault they were in the current situation. Mr. Trump told Mr. Sessions that choosing him to be attorney general was one of the worst decisions he had made, called him an “idiot,” and said that he should resign.
Hmm, someone's a little touchy about Russia, no? According to the article, Trump is convinced that Sessions is thee source of all his Russia problems. Sessions’ recusal was the original sin, in Trump’s view, "the moment his administration effectively lost control over the inquiry.”
Heh. Right. Not to go to bat for Sessions, but c'mon—the Don Jr./Manafort/Kushner/Kremlin meeting, Flynn's covert sanctions conversations along with all that Russian moola he was pocketing, Kushner's Kremlin backchannel, the moment Trump dropped the hammer on James Comey? Meh. No, Sessions recusing himself was the real problem.
Anyhoo, if you can't stand Sessions, you'll love this:
Ashen and emotional, Mr. Sessions told the president he would quit and sent a resignation letter to the White House, according to four people who were told details of the meeting. Mr. Sessions would later tell associates that the demeaning way the president addressed him was the most humiliating experience in decades of public life. [...]
For Mr. Sessions, the aggressiveness with which Mr. Trump has sought his removal was a blow. The son of a general store owner in a small town in Alabama, Mr. Sessions had long wanted to be the nation’s top federal law enforcement official or to serve in another top law enforcement or judicial post. [...]
Administration officials and some of Mr. Trump’s outside advisers have puzzled at Mr. Sessions’s decision to stay on. But people close to Mr. Sessions said that he did not leave because he had a chance to have an impact on what he sees as an issue of his career: curtailing legal and illegal immigration.
So apparently Sessions clawed his way up to the top so that he could kick anyone below him in the teeth. What a stand up guy.
The alternative narrative is that as humiliating as being excoriated by Trump was, nothing would be more humiliating than being forced to resign in ignominy from the post you've dreamt about obtaining your entire life.
But don't worry, the history books will render Sessions an ‘idiot’ one way or the other. Presiding over a culture of bigotry never plays well to future generations, and leaving a cushy Senate seat to work for Trump was a fool’s errand from the start.